Rights groups say the Supreme Court's Aravalli hearings are being run for the mining lobby

Civil rights groups in Rajasthan have called for an overhaul in how the Supreme Court-appointed high-powered committee on the Aravalli hill range conducts its hearings, arguing that public participation in them has been neither meaningful nor inclusive. The committee is currently visiting hill regions in Delhi, Haryana and Rajasthan.

The Supreme Court has directed the committee to carry out an independent review of the Centre's report on the definition and delineation of the Aravalli hill range, and to address what it called critical ambiguities in the findings. The panel is also to examine the overall ecology of the region and its impact on people's lives and socio-economic conditions.

That mandate, the organisations say, cannot be discharged in the time allotted. In a statement they described the exercise as amounting to a token tour of nine districts in just four days, and said any meaningful discussion of the Aravallis would remain incomplete without the participation of rural communities, farmers, pastoralists and experts on water resources.

The committee has held public hearings in Alwar, Ajmer and elsewhere. The People's Union for Civil Liberties and other groups allege that the mining lobby dominated those hearings and that the administration made no meaningful effort to inform or involve ordinary people. For the hearing in Ajmer, they say, a large number of mining operators and other stakeholders were brought in from Nagaur and Makrana. When representatives of people's groups objected to how the hearing was being run, attempts were made to silence them, according to PUCL-Rajasthan president Anant Bhatnagar.

Bhatnagar said the committee must travel to rural and mining-affected areas and examine ground realities directly, including meeting silicosis patients whose lives have been damaged by mining.

The groups also question who sits on the panel. They called its composition inappropriate and demanded representation for all relevant stakeholders, noting that the chairperson and two members are representatives of the very department that had earlier recommended that only hills rising more than 100 metres should be counted as part of the Aravallis. That recommendation matters, because where the boundary of the range is drawn decides which land is protected and which is open to mining.

Their demands are an extension of the committee's tenure, a transparent and genuinely participatory process, a comprehensive study covering every district falling within the Aravalli region, and field visits to rural and mining-affected areas. A comprehensive ecological, social, economic and hydrological assessment must be undertaken, Bhatnagar said, before any final conclusions are drawn.

The statement was signed by the PUCL along with Save Aravalli, Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan, Shahabad Valley Sangharsh Samiti, Climate Action for Youth and Jaldhara. Bhatnagar said that if the committee failed to make its process genuinely participatory, the people's groups would organise their own public hearings at locations across the Aravalli region.